Along the way, however, there are some important tips you really ought to follow for a successful website design.

1. Make Your Navigation Bar Easy to Find

You want to make sure that anybody who visits your site can navigate easily and find what they need.

Otherwise, they’re not likely to stick around long. Tell your web designer that you’d like a fixed navigation bar; this means it’ll always be prominent and in the same spot on the page, whether it be along the top or on one of the sides.

2. Invest in Quality Photos

Even if it means hiring a professional photographer, make sure you’ve got some professional-looking photos on your site (or obtain them from a stock website, if appropriate).

This is especially important if you’re looking to sell merchandise, as your potential customers will want to get an accurate idea of what the product looks like before spending their hard-earned money.

3. Select a Universal Font

Another tip to keep in mind when contemplating your website design is to choose fonts that are easily readable and universal.

You don’t want to scare website visitors away with a font that’s difficult-to-read. Instead, select a font that’s traditional and simple, such as a serif or sans serif font.

4. Ensure Your Website is ready for mobile devices

Because many people surf the web using mobile devices, such as tablets and smartphones, you need to make sure your size can be easily viewed on as many devices as possible.

This is known as responsive design and allows your site to detect what type of device the site is being viewed on–and then optimizes it for the best appearance and functionality. Make sure your web designer can integrate responsive design.

5. Update Your Website Regularly

Finally, keep your website among the tops of the search engine results by publishing relevant and interesting blog posts on your site regularly.

Fresh, new content will optimize your search engine ranking. If writing isn’t your thing, you can always hire a freelancer to produce content for you as needed or work with a marketing agency.

Keep these tips in mind as you plan the design for your new site and you’ll be off to a good start.